The present invention relates to a fastener feeding apparatus which is adapted for concurrently feeding a plurality of fasteners to respective driving devices.
In many manufacturing operations, it is conventional to mount several automatic screwdrivers on a common frame, which is periodically advanced to engage a workpiece and so that several screws can be simultaneously driven into the workpiece. Heretofore, the screws have been delivered to each of the screwdrivers by a separate feeding apparatus which typically includes a vibrating feed hopper and feed assembly as described for example in U.S. Pat. No. 5,004,141. The required number of such feeding apparatus is costly, and they occupy a significant amount of space which is not always available.
To reduce the number of required feed hoppers, and thus the cost of the feeding apparatus, it has been proposed to provide the bowls with up to three fastener delivery chutes coming off at different locations about the periphery of the hopper, but this arrangement is limited to a small number of delivery chutes which can be mounted on the bowl without interfering with its operation.
It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide a single fastener feeding apparatus which is able to reliably and economically delivery fasteners to a plurality of driving devices.
It is a more particular object of the present invention to provide a fastener feeding apparatus which has the capability of delivering fasteners to each of a plurality of driving devices, and which requires only a single vibratory feed hopper and a single fastener delivery chute leading from the feed hopper.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a fastener feeding apparatus which is capable of receiving a plurality of fasteners from a single delivery chute, and then carrying the fasteners to a release or dump position where they are simultaneously released into respective discharge tubes which lead to the driving devices.